The Trade (A Hans Larsson Novel Book 2) (31 page)

H
ans
came around tied to a chair in a dimly lit chamber deep in the bowels of the
castle. Head thumping, throat parched, and blinking in the gloom, he felt a thick
cake of congealed blood mixed with volcanic grit cracking around his left eye
and temple.

Gonzales sat behind a simple desk with Hans’ and Logan’s
weapons and cell phones piled on top of it. His butler, Fernando, leant against
the wall behind him, giggling softly like a lunatic.

“Senhor Larsson,” the mayor hissed as he sat there snakelike.
“So nice to have your company again.”

“Commandante Three-Eighty,” Hans rasped, spitting out dirt.

“I see you have done your homework,” said the mayor with the
air of a victor, clearly reveling in a plan come good. “Then you must know who
this is.” He turned to his butler.

“I expect you’re going to enlighten me.”

Hans stared into the mayor’s eyes yet took in everything in
the room. The motionless mass on the floor was Logan, Hans figuring he was
dead.

“Allow me to introduce you to Sargento Chavez.” He turned to
acknowledge the butler, who grunted. “As my most loyal man in Central America,
he was better known as El Chacal. Tell me, do you know much Nicaraguan
folklore, Senhor Larsson?”

“I’m a huge fan.”

“Then you will know El Chacal, “the Jackal,” is a fearsome creature
that lives in the woods, a beast half-man, half-wolf-dog. Sometimes his clothes
are made of twigs and leaves and his face the color of the forest, so he remains
invisible. Other times he wanders naked along the footpaths in search of the
next child to kill. El Chacal is said to stare into his victims’ souls as he
strangles them to death. Can you see why Sargento Chavez earned this
reputation, Senhor Larsson? Can you imagine the unspeakable acts we got away
with down there? Can you imagine the unspeakable acts he has committed against
your daughter?”

Hans felt an enormous urge to try to rip free from the chair
but knew this was not his time.

“What do you want?” he asked.

“What makes you think I want something?” the mayor preened.

“Because if you didn’t I would be dead now.”

“Ha-ha! Senhor Hans, once again you have it wrong. It is not
what
I
want from
you
, it is what I want
done
to you.”

He looked to his sergeant, and they chuckled like old hands.

A faint groan came from Logan’s motionless body.

“ . . . and to our playboy friend here.” Gonzales picked an
aging revolver off the desk and waved it limply at the two of them.

Hans recognized it as a Colt M1911, standard US military issue
before the smaller-caliber Beretta M9 replaced it, a pistol the CIA shipped in its
thousands to the Contras.

At the thought of the agency, Hans decided to play his trump
card.

“You know I have informed the CIA of your involvement in the
Trade, Gonzales. Their agent on the island will be filing a report and
initiating a full-scale investigation.”

“You are correct, Hans!” boomed a familiar voice from the
back of the room. “You
have
informed the CIA.” Enrique stepped out of
the shadows and placed a hand on his fellow American’s shoulder. “But I shall
not be filing a report, and there certainly won’t be any investigation –
full-scale or otherwise.”

“Enrique,” Hans muttered, shaking his head and looking down
at the floor.

“I gather you know the third member of our team quite well.”
Gonzales smirked. “In Nicaragua we called him ‘the Boy.’ When the CIA said they
are sending a ‘junior’ field agent to coordinate my platoon, we all laughed. ‘Junior’?
we say, because in Spanish ‘junior’ means ‘little rich boy.’ So we nickname him
‘the Boy.’” He looked at Enrique, the fondness evident in his reticent eyes.

“The little rich boy who made you a fortune exporting
cocaine!” Enrique reminded the former rebel commander.

The three Hispanics guffawed like reunited veterans the
world over.

“Actually, Hans,” Enrique continued, “the only investigation
will be the one conducted by our, erhum, ‘friends’ in the police here on the
islands, who naturally will find nothing. Your daughter is going to a sex gang
in Europe, and we simply cannot have her big hero father hunting us down for
the rest of our lives. So this is why” – he held up Hans’ and Eddy’s cell
phones – “I have sent a text from Mr. Logan’s phone to yours inviting you and
Penny for an afternoon out on his boat. And” – he waggled Hans’ phone – “you
have texted back in agreement. Of course, after I have gone to the villa and had
a little fun with Penny before I kill her, we will put all your dead bodies in
the cabin of Mr. Logan’s boat, along with the English girl, and then sink it
far out in the channel, where it will never be found, except by the sharks.”

Another round of laughter ensued, the former resistance
fighters in their element as a team.

“There’s one little glitch in your plan,” Hans interrupted
them. “I’m assuming it was you tailing me on Mindelo the night you killed the
Fulani.”

“Ah!” Enrique beamed. “Would we be talking about the fingerprints
from that bitch’s house you sent to your lab
and
a certain rental car
agreement? Listen to this.”

He played a voice mail on Hans’ phone.

Orion, it’s Muttley. Look, Odysseus and I have been
trying to get hold of you. The fingerprints belong to Enrique Ramos, your CIA
friend, and the car was rented in his name, too
. . .

“So what is with the code names – er, Orion?” Enrique mocked.

“Why, worried you’re in over your head?”

“Just curious. Besides, I have sent your ‘Muttley’ this
text.” He scrolled through the list on Hans’ cell. “Ah, yes, I wrote, ‘Cancel
this. CIA contact here informs me he interviewed the Fulani woman on the night in
question as per agency protocol.’”

Hans’ blood boiled. The CIA man had the upper hand,
explaining both his renting of the hire car and his fingerprints on the glass.

Enrique reached into his inside pocket and pulled out an
identical walkie-talkie to the one he’d issued Hans at the embassy along with
the pistol, spotting scope and bulletproof vest. Holding it in front of Hans’ face,
“All the embassy’s field radios operate on the same set of frequencies.” He chuckled.
“I also took the liberty of fitting a tracking device into yours.”

“Hence how you followed me to the Fulani’s house and warned
Logan I was breaking into his boat.”

“And how I laughed from my ‘hospital’ bed listening as you
bozos crept toward La Laguna this afternoon, and I was already here with a
garbage can primed full of Semtex and a sniper rifle aimed at your head. I would
have killed you if I’d adjusted a little more for the wind.”

“The same Semtex and US military-issued detonator you used
to blow up the
Rosa Negra.
” Hans scowled.

“And to think you didn’t suspect a thing.” Enrique held his
hands up and grinned like a court jester.

“Actually, that’s where you’re wrong.” Hans had one final
card up his sleeve. “I suspected you all along, and I have already made a
report to my friends with the ‘code names,’ as you joke, detailing as much.”

“I’m . . . not so sure I believe you, Hans,” said Enrique,
feeling sure of himself. “I can’t see how I could have given anything away.”

“Nothing . . . at . . . all?” Hans played up the moment, seizing
the opportunity to jump in the driving seat. “First off, how come you never
suggested I file a missing persons report, which would have got the CIA
involved in Jessica’s disappearance under the
US Trafficking Victims Act
? That would have been the
logical thing for you to have done.”

Enrique gave a nonchalant shrug.

“Then there was the meeting in Karen’s office when you
agreed to help us
off
the record with the investigation into Logan. I
said I appreciated your time. Do you remember what you replied?”

“I have no idea, but I’m sure you will remind me.”

“You said, ‘Four people are dead, Hans. I’ll make time.’”

“And?”

“How could you have known? The news stations reported Alvarez
and his two crew members as injured – and perhaps your sources told you they
were dead – but I never mentioned meeting the Fulani to anyone other than Penny
and Karen. I knew there and then you had to be involved in the Trade. If I disappear,
then the information in my report is enough for my friends with the code names
to spend their vast resources tracking you down.”

Enrique kept quiet, knowing better than to incriminate
himself while figuring out if Hans was bluffing.

Of course, Hans
was
bluffing. He had thought it
strange, a little
niggling
, when Enrique came up with the number “four”
in that conversation, but he’d put it down to a genuine mistake resulting from
conflicting news reports surrounding the
Rosa Negra
’s sinking
.

“You know, the Chinese have a saying – ‘Never enter a big
game without the backing of a big player.’” Hans made his closing gambit. “You
need to know I have that big player. In fact, I have a bigger player than you
or your small-time agency buddies could ever imagine.”

“Thank you for the lesson in Chinese psychology, Hans.”
Enrique remained nonplussed. “But you of all people must know that to strike a
bargain you need to have something to offer. If what you’re telling me is true and
I let you go free with your daughter and Mr. Logan, then I go to jail for the rest
of my life. And if I kill all of you as planned and your ‘big players’ catch
me, I go to jail for the rest of my life. But what if you are lying? We kill
you all and Penny and dispose of your bodies. Then we all remain free men – for
the rest of our lives. And Hans” – Enrique brought his face close – “I think
you
are
lying.”

The mayor looked at his butler. Both frowned, hoping Enrique
was right.

“Okay! Enough talk,” Enrique barked in Spanish. “I am going
to the villa. When you have done what you need to do, bring their bodies and
the Davenport girl’s to Logan’s house in
his
car.” He looked to
Fernando. “Wrap them in plastic to make sure there is no blood, and wear gloves
to drive. I will meet you at his place and have Logan’s boat ready. I’ll call our
speedboat guy and arrange a meet offshore to bring us back.” He removed the BMW’s
key from Logan’s key ring and threw it to Fernando Chavez.

“And what about the American brat and the Malian woman?” the
mayor asked.

“You bring them in your car. After we sink Logan’s boat and the
speedboat drops us to shore, he will take the two of them north to the
Canaries.”

Logan groaned and began to writhe on the floor. The
traffickers had cuffed his wrists and ankles using his own plastic ties.

Enrique stared into space for a moment, going over all the
loose ends in his mind. Then he threw Hans a mocking two-fingered salute,
picked up the sniper rifle and left the room.

Hans’ heartbeat stepped up as he envisaged the heinous acts
Enrique would subject Penny to before he killed her. He wondered why the CIA
man hadn’t executed him and Logan there and then. He didn’t have to wait long
for an answer.

“Fetch the
señorita
,” Gonzales ordered his former
sergeant, “and be quick.”

Fernando disappeared and returned seconds later with Umchima.
Hans recognized her immediately as the manager of the orphanage in Gambia, the
woman he and Penny had followed to the beachfront restaurant the previous day.

She eyed him with disdain.

“Forgive me if I’m tired of formal introductions, Senhor
Larsson,” said the mayor, yawning. “But Miss Brenda here is taking your sweet little
Jessica to a safe house in the Canary Islands as a precaution while we dispose
of your bodies. From there a very nice man will deliver her to a gang of
terribly sick people in Europe. They have paid good money to abuse her, which
they will probably do for a couple of years, after which they will cut her
throat and burn her pathetic worn-out body in an incinerator.”

“Then ‘Miss Brenda’ and I have unfinished business.” Hans
glared right through the mayor’s callous eyes.

“Oh! Perhaps I didn’t explain.” Gonzales pointed his pistol
in the air and cocked it. “If Miss Brenda wishes to involve herself in our
little secret, then she must prove herself first.”

Umchima looked at the mayor, her flared pupils and nostrils radiating
gleeful enthusiasm.

“Brenda, kill them and then the Davenport girl,” he snapped.

“Certainly, Videl.” Umchima took the Colt and leveled it at
Hans’ face.

They looked each other in the eye . . .

Hans winked.

Umchima turned and shot the mayor in the head, his brains
splattering across the whitewashed stonework.

Fernando’s eyes widened as he registered the look of
surprise still etched on his slumped boss’s face.

Umchima shot him twice in the gut and then dispatched him with
a shot to the temple.

“Special Agent Trudy Bansker, CIA,” she announced, pulling
out a switchblade and cutting Hans free.

“That figures.” Hans chuckled and shook the blood back into
his hands.

With no time to explain, he grabbed his M9 off the table and
holstered it, then picked up his cell phone and took the BMW key from the dead butler’s
hand.

“Can you take care of Logan and the girls?”

“Go!” the special agent replied.

Hans tore up a flight of stairs and, rather than waste time
looking for an exit door, threw up a sash window and climbed out into the
courtyard, where one of the traffickers had parked Logan’s BMW. Hans jumped into
the driver’s seat, feeling thankful he was getting into the vehicle alive.

Wheels spinning, Hans flung the rear of the car around and
shot through the entrance tunnel. Enrique had three or four minutes on him, but
Porsche or no Porsche, Hans knew who the better driver was. He picked up his
cell phone and dialed Penny.

Her voice mail kicked in.

“Penny,” Hans spoke calmly. “Enrique is coming to kill you.
Get out of the villa! Do
not
take the jeep. Take Karen’s boat and go
around the point. Don’t waste time carrying the motor down to the water. Just row
out and stay close to the rocks, because he’s got a rifle.”

Hans threw the phone into the center console and
concentrated on the road. Arriving at the junction onto the highway, he slid
the car around, taking the right fork faster than Logan did when coming in the
other direction, accelerating away leaving a cloud of rubber smoke. He focused
on his breathing and reined in his adrenaline-fueled mind, preventing himself
from driving too fast around the sharp bends and slowing the speed his
surroundings flew past at by half.

Passing car after car, Hans stayed on the left side of the
road, only pulling back across when a corner loomed or a vehicle came in the
other direction. He reckoned he’d significantly closed the gap between him and
Enrique, coming over the brow of a hill to see the Porsche stuck behind a truck
in the distance. Hans eased off the gas and, steering the car with his knee,
cocked the M9 and placed it back in the holster. His plan was to pull up
alongside the Porsche and slam it off the road, but as he put his foot to the floor,
Enrique blipped past the truck and sped off.

As Hans closed on the truck, the road narrowed, preventing
him from passing. He considered flashing his headlights and honking the horn
but knew from experience this wound truck drivers up and resulted in them
blocking you from overtaking.

Hans pulled back, fighting to remain calm and give the
impression of a carefree driver, but as soon as a gap appeared he pulled into
the trucker’s blind spot, dropped down a gear and floored the BMW.

Closing on the truck’s tailgate at a hair-raising speed, Hans
pulled out at the last moment and, leaning out of the window to check the route
was clear, shot past the goods vehicle before the driver even realized, losing
a wing mirror in the process.

With only a few hundred yards to the villa, anxiety kicked
in despite Hans’ best efforts to control it. There was no way he could catch
Enrique. Nor was there time to phone Penny again – it would waste the precious
seconds between them. He pulled into Karen’s driveway and skidded to a halt in
front of the villa, praying Penny had received his message.

Hans leapt from the car and ran toward the terrace, rounding
the building to a scene that filled him with horror.

Time slowed down . . .

He saw Penny’s terrified expression as she pulled frantically
at the oars of Karen’s boat, knowing her efforts were in vain.

Enrique stood by the terrace wall, aiming the sniper rifle.

Hans knew from such a close distance, so long as the CIA
agent went for a body shot there was no way he could miss. He sprinted across
the flagstones and dived through the air . . . as the shot rang out.

The high-velocity slug smashed into Penny’s chest, the shock
wave rippling through her body with such force her arms flung outwards, snapping
one of the oars, and she slumped in the bow.

Hans slammed into Enrique’s outstretched figure, knocking
the rifle from his hands, the two of them flying over the terrace wall and plummeting
into the sea. As Enrique panicked and began flailing for the surface, Hans felt
a primordial surge of hatred from deep within. Enrique may well have been top
dog when it came to trafficking children, but, in Navy SEAL territory now, he was
about to pay dearly for his crimes.

From his Basic Underwater Demolition/SEAL, “BUD/S” training,
Hans knew Enrique had broken the first rule of survival – do not panic! By
struggling, he was using up the air in his lungs four times faster than Hans,
who was in his element.

Although the M9 could fire underwater, Hans wouldn’t risk
drawing it and losing a hold around Enrique’s waist, opting to continue powering
downwards with determined kicks. It was payback time for what he had done to
all those terrified kids – moreover, the price for messing with Jessica Kerry
Larsson.

Enrique was not about to give up. He stopped his bid for the
surface and attempted to draw a knife from a sheath strapped to his calf. Hans
sensed his adversary curl into a ball and in the lessened visibility could make
out a chrome pommel protruding from the Nicaraguan’s pant leg.

As Enrique arched his body in an attempt to unsheathe his
blade, Hans used all his strength three times to shake him away from it –
albeit unsuccessfully, for the next thing Hans felt was jarring pain, Enrique
thrusting the knife over his head and sinking its razor-sharp point into Hans’ shoulder
blade.

Unperturbed, the former Navy SEAL pulled his head out of the
way and let the CIA man stab into his bone, knowing the knife tip missed his
vital organs.

Hans continued kicking downwards until they contacted the
sand. In utter desperation Enrique changed tack and shoved the knife through one
of the wrists Hans had wrapped around his waist.

Hans’ mind screamed at him to lose his hold, but instead he
placed his other hand over the knife pommel and thrust it in further – right into
Enrique’s stomach, the shock forcing him to take an involuntary breath.

For what seemed an age, the Nicaraguan writhed in death
throes before his body finally went limp. Hans grimaced and yanked out the
stiletto, letting it drop to the seabed. Then he spun the dead CIA agent around
and, gripping him by his lapels, stared into a face contorted by fear – eyes bulging
and tongue poking out. In that moment Enrique’s vanity, wealth and reputation
meant nothing. Hans thrust the lifeless clown away and began swimming underwater
in the direction of the boat.

Adrenaline from the fight waned as the crushing reality of
Penny’s death replaced it. Hans couldn’t believe that after everything she’d
sacrificed for him and Jessie, after everything had come right, he was
recovering the body of his partner and unborn baby. A wailing anger built up
inside, and as Hans burst to the surface he screamed, “
Noooooo
!
Ahhhhh, nooooooooooooo
!”

Crying like a child, he swam the last few yards to where the
skiff’s cheerful bob belied a scene he couldn’t bear to witness. Throwing a
bloody arm around the gunwale, Hans was about to haul himself on board when he
heard movement.

“Jeez, Hans! Does it always hurt this much when you’re
wearing one of these?” She tried to pull open the Velcro flap on the
bulletproof vest –

“Oh, Penn—”

– and collapsed into unconsciousness.